Rotary screen printing presses are well known, such as the one disclosed and illustrated in U.S. Pat. No. 3,155,034. Such presses utilize a printing screen that is cylindrical in form such as those illustrated in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,482,300; 3,696,741; 3,759,799; and 3,759,800. The preferred types of metal screens are the rigidized woven metal screen as particularly disclosed in my U.S. Pat. No. 3,482,300, or the all-metal self-supporting screen disclosed in my U.S. Pat. No. 3,759,799. One of the advantages of such screens is that they can be made in a variety of screen mesh counts such as from a fine screen of 400 mesh to a coarse screen of 32 mesh having thread diameters of 0.86 to 1 mil in order to satisfy a variety of screen printing applications.
With respect to making a cylindrical printing screen from metal woven mesh screen material of the type disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,482,300 and U.S. Pat. No. 3,759,799, a screen section is cut and cylindrically shaped with edges overlapped and usually bonded together with adhesive such as an epoxy. The overlapped seam can also be welded by a resistance welder, but in either case, the overlapped seam defines a rough area along the screen over which the squeegee of the printing press has to jump on each revolution of the screen. The faster the printing speed the greater the jump because the blade has some flexibility. The time the blade jumps or is in the jump or spaced from the screen constitutes the recovery time for the blade to return to the screen, and an increase in recovery time relates to the distance or the length of the jump, and the distance becomes longer. Accordingly, a specified gap size along the screen where it will not print is produced depending on the speed. With the advent of faster and faster rotary screen printing presses and the demand for faster printing speeds, the specified gap size becomes a major problem.